Reed Richards: You know what? Maybe not candy. Because, really, I haven't worked out that level of calculation. Who knows what happens when you send a- a nougat cluster or chocolate into a negative dimension. I could be sending them a bomb for all I know... or poison.

Victor Van Damme: I was perfect. I have always been perfect. You were never perfect. Scrawny little effort of a man. I can recite my family tree through six hundred years and I can recite the correct superpositioning code. Even now. Even now. You never understood that science is an art, not a system. Modern science comes from Descartes, who said that the conquest of nature is achieved through measurement and number. Do you know how he came to that realization? He had a psychedelic experience with mushrooms in which an angel told him this was so.

Chrono Bandit:(to Reed) . . . And no funny business. I know you can stretch like a rubber band and I know Invisible Woman can turn invisible. We studied you guys before we hacked into your files. We know all about you 'Mr. Fantastic'.

Susan Storm: What about my force fields? You ever seen one of my force fields before?

Reporter: Hey, guys. New York Daily News. How did you find out that the Chrono-Bandits were gonna hold the human race for ransom?

Benjamin Grimm: Believe it or not, it was in our horoscopes this morning.

(Reed teleports to a parallel dimension. However, instead of the almost-simialr world he was led to expect, he finds a wrecked cityscape. He is ambushed by the person who called him here - this dimension's Reed Richards, who is revealed as a walking corpse)

Zombie Reed: Ever get the feeling you've been had?

Reed: Sue, I'm sorry I went missing for a day, but there was -Sue: Oh no, let me guess. You found a... a new parallel universe? With - with younger versions of ourselves? There was drama, danger, you saved untold universes...Reed: ...something like that, yes.
- Marvel Knights 4 #21(running at the same time as this story)

Ben Grimm:(in tears) Ah, Johnny, you got it easy. Since the accident, you get to go to cool parties and hang out with cool chicks. Me, I just think about suicide. I mean, I figured, hey, no big deal, Reed such a megabrain he'll have me back to normal in a couple of months. But he ain't run tests on me in weeks, and I'm really startin' to get it. This skin condition, this radioactive thing I got here - this ain't goin' away. This is permanent. I'd kill myself if I could find a razor sharp enough. You think maybe Reed could help me with that?

(Reed and Sue step into shot, but still out of Ben's view. Reed in silent tears)

Ben Grimm: You think that's too much to ask?

Child: Gosh, thanks for your autograph, Mr. Grimm. Here's a card with my number on it, so you can call for my help next time you get attacked by the Trapster or something, OK?

Ben Grimm Ah... OK kid, but I gotta tell you, I got a lot of these cards at home...

(mysterious shadow falls across the street)

Jasmine: Look! Up in the sky!

Ben Grimm: Relax, it's just a meteorite. And in two -

(Masked man flies under the meteorite, catches it, and throws it back into space)

Masked Man: Sorry I cut it too fine there, Ben. All clear.

Ben Grimm: Nah, happens all the time. Its the occupational hazard of being the last normal guy alive. Gotta let the super-people have their fun.

Super-Skrull: You hear that? That's the sound of a billion people dying. Now it's a million. The superpower pills - they always work. Why didn't you take one? You're the first person not to accept them since we began our conquest of the universe. And unlike that idiot Thor or all those stupid mutants we're hunting down right now, you weren't anything special to begin with. Now it's a hundred -

Ben Grimm:(cradling dying girlfriend) No...

Super-Skrull: Now it's five - four - three - two - one. Congratulations, Mr. Grimm, you're now officially the last surviving member of your species. What's so funny? Is there something amusing about my Skrull fleets dominating your world?

Ben Grimm: No...

Super-Skrull: Then why are you laughing, you imbecile?

Ben Grimm: Because all those powers you were boastin' about... all those millions of different super-abilities...and you still ain't got two brain cells to rub together

Reed: Johnny, as far as we can tell, you have a parasitic growth in your intestine. You probably got it in the N-Zone, but we missed it somehow in the quarantine -

Human Torch: And in words I can understand...

Sue Storm: You're pregnant.

Human Torch:Those lying skanks. I knew this would happen eventually!

Sue Storm: Crystal, for God's sake! If this thing grows, it'll spread over the entire planet and that means the Inhumans are at just as much risk as the rest of us!

Crystal:(looking up at the Moon) Not where we are now...

Mary Storm: Richards and my daughter have just arrived at the front door - and a full four minutes earlier than you predicted, too.

Victor van Damme: Then I suggest you reset your watch, woman. Doctor Doom does not make mistakes.

Zombie Mister Fantastic: (explaining his escape plan) Oh, it's just a ballpoint pen, sargeant. Though I will admit, it's amazing what you can do with ink and the chemicals from our food. I even managed to use a strand of hair as a keyboard. Granted, it's a pretty crude teleporter, but it'll get us to Central Park.

(After they have conned the guards into opening all the doors)

Zombie Invisible Woman: A teleporter made from ink and food coloring? Are you guys a specal kind of moron?

Zombie Human Torch: Sure they are, sis. Kentucky-fried moron.

Doctor Doom has trapped himself in the zombie's dimension, and is promptly seen by a group of the zombies, who charge at him.

Human Torch: The Mole Man? But he got buried under like a bazillion tons of rock. He's dead. Right?

Thing: House is currently offering odds of three to one.

Mole Man: Ha! Who but I, the Mole Man, could built a hydraulic platform under an entire building?

Fungal Monster Servant: (Unintelligible noises)

Mole Man: Well, yes. But Tony Stark's not here, is he?

Strange Josie: Why the fricking hell did you kidnap us?

Mole Man: Because the world needs a life-raft. Eventually, the modern world will slip up. Slip and fall. But you children, with your exceptional minds... you will be the seeds from which a superior society will someday rise. Here, in the ruins of Lemuria, we will work and research. And, above all... breed.

Reed Richards: Amazing. That sounds alive. But did Mole Man create it here, or just find it?

Thing: Shouldn't we worry about it finding us?

Reed Richards: Oh, the acoustics in these tunnels is nuts. They could be miles away, or -

(A quartet of giant monster round the corner and charge the Fantastic Four)

Thing: Yeah. Or.

Strange Josie: Hey, Mole Man. Two points. One: locking up a bunch of weird scientists in a room full of weird science? Not smart. And two? I don't even like boys.

Gus' log: After we beat the Mole Man, Reed Richards wanted us to back to the surface. But we had the Lemurian super-weapons. And we had Strange Josie. All they had were super-powers. But they agreed with us in the end. It was harder to convince General Ross. He said the military had invested a lot in our education. He said he'd call the Ultimates. he said he'd call our parents. The Strange Josie started the hydraulics and they went away. We started taking the machinery apart immediately. It was hard for the first few weeks, eating mycoproteins and wearing the smelly clothes off the first loom. But it paid off - the artificial sun rose for the first time in over ten thousand years yesterday. This isn't a forever thing. We'll go back up there, someday. When we've worked out the answers to all the really big questions. But we're going to take our time. Get it absolutely right. We don't have any reason to rush.

(View pans out, to show Gus, Strange Josie & co, sitting in barricaded rooms in the middle of a city overrun with giant monsters.)

(Gang of alien soldiers teleport into a lingerie department, causing a wreck)

Magnificent Brute: Ha! We did it! No Ravens, no Bombardiers - we did it and we got out clean! I told you there was a world here!

Vykni: (commenting on New York City and its people) This place smells. And the indigenes--they look just human enough to be creepy. It's like a bad sense-net flick. Planet of the Monkey People.

(In the aftermath of a fight between the FF and the alien soldiers, Willy Lumpkin arrives to escort the team back home)

Lumpkin: Doctor Richards. How are you?

Reed Richards: I got shot four times in the chest. So either they suck at aiming, or I don't store anything important in there anymore.

Lumpkin: That's great. Get your stuff, kid. We're taking you back to the Baxter Building for a medical work-up.

Sue Storm: Not without the alien's... spacecraft thing. I want to examine it.

Lumpkin: Well, hey. Ain't we got fun.

(An alien artifact near the alien craft begins to glow)

Reed Richards: Hey, they left something else behind. That whole "sucky alien" theory is beginning to look a lot more solid.

(The artifact brings Reed to a dreamscape)

Giant Woman: I greet you, Reed Richards, in the name of the All. Take my hand, and walk with me.

Reed Richards: Why? It's not real.

'Giant Woman:(smiling mysteriously)Isn't it?

Reed Richards: I can feel cold tiles on one side of my face, and I can smell... solder and disinfectant. Ergo, I'm lying unconscious on the floor of my lab, and you're projecting this into my mind. So the big question is, who are you?

Giant Woman: I am Seed Nineteen, of the planet Halycon. My children, whom you met briefly, are named for me. Collectively, they are also Seed Nineteen. They are brave and unique people. I think you'd like them. That is - if I decide to let you live.

...

Reed Richards: Are you going to put a knife in me, or what?

Giant Woman: While your mind is here, I control you autonomic functions. I can stop your heart. Stall your lungs. Starve your brain.

Reed Richards: I don't have a heart anymore. And no-one knows what I breathe. It's why I'm able to stretch. So leaving aside your motive once again, may I say that you're flunking basic intimidation here.

...

Giant Woman: Wait! I sense - Gallowglass! How did he follow them? Unless - no! He could never have subverted one of my children! We must trust each other now, Reed Richards. We have no other choices left.

Reed Richards: The storm troopers. The torture chambers. The executions. You're afraid of what these people would do if they were free.

Thanos: Freedom is disorder. It is the hole in the universe which lets in randomness and chaos. So I subjugate the wills of others to my own will. With biomechanical devices, as in the case of Tesseract. Or simply through terror and coercion. And they thank me. They give up their freedom willingly. They never knew what to do with it in the first place. Do you understand me, Reed Richards?

Reed Richards: Oh yeah. I understand you okay. But fascism is kind of retro where I come from. No one's been seriously into it for sixty years or so.

Threshold: You are an incomparable warrior, Reed Richards! It was your plan that saved us!

Reed Richards: I'm no warrior, Threshold. I simply -

(Threshold begins kissing Reed Richards, until she tapped on the shoulder by Sue Storm)

Sue Storm: So. It's real fun, having you around, but it'll be kind of hard for you to walk home with no spine.

Reed Richards: We're figuring out the variables before we go through. No-one is going anywhere.

Johnny Storm: Hey, this goes to like the Middle Ages. I think we can deal.

Reed Richards: Right. It was put together by a guy in the Middle Ages who's mastered time-travel. Are you thinking at all? My sister and your dad are in there, and I will not lose them because you felt like burning off excess hormones.

Diablo:(stealing Reed's breath using alchemy)So tell me, Signore Richards, which, once and for all do you think is stronger - my magic or your science?

Reed Richards:(reaching for a device on his belt) Sss -

Diablo: Science? I do not think so. Goodbye, Signore Richards.

Reed Richards:(revealing the device - it is the remote control for a bomb) Circuit breaker.